Although my eye and jaw still throbbed from Zander’s fists, my heart had stopped aching over him long ago. I wished it hadn’t taken me so long to reach this point, but it was better late than never.
Our last argument, it had been so stupid. This was partially because he’d been drunk, but that was nothing new. Once again, he had come home late, filthy drunk as usual; how he never managed to crash his car and kill himself had become an endless source of frustration for me.
This time, he threw a fit because I hadn’t set the DVR to record one of his favorite television programs that I didn’t even know he watched.
He landed one good blow on me, hard enough to make stars dance in my eyes. But I fought through it, staying conscious and managing to dodge the second strike. Staggering through the apartment, I grabbed my car keys and my cell phone before bolting from the apartment, not caring about the roaring thunder and bright lightning flashing through the sky. I just wanted to get out.
Unfortunately, I hadn’t had time to charge my phone battery before leaving, which resulted in me having to make a stop at the nearest gas station in the pouring rain, hoping the old and outdated payphone located there still worked.
“Good evening, ma’am,” the store clerk said. I hurried inside, keeping my head low despite knowing how odd I looked wearing sunglasses during a thunderstorm. Even though it made me look suspicious, I was grateful for the fact that I always kept a pair of sunglasses in the glove compartment of my car.
“Is everything all right?” the store clerk asked, although he could clearly see that I was far from it. Glancing briefly up at him, I saw that he was a kind looking older man with white hair and concerned eyes.
I fumbled inside of my pocket and pulled out a wrinkled dollar. “Can I please have four quarters?” I asked, my teeth chattering thanks to the rain clinging to my skin, chilling me to the bone.
“Yes, certainly,” he said, retrieving the change from the cash register.
I could sense that he wanted to say something else to me, but I hurried back out the door, not giving him the opportunity. When I reached the payphone, I dialed the first number that came to mind.
“Hello?” came my brother’s voice. Already I could hear concern in his voice, as if he somehow intuitively knew it was me. My big brother had always been protective of me, and I sometimes suspected he possessed a sixth sense that let him know whenever I was in trouble.
“Tobias,” I choked out.
“Jo? What’s wrong?”
“Zander…”
“What did he do? I’ll kill him.”
I sniffed loudly and took a deep breath. “Don’t be ridiculous. What good will you be to me if you’re in jail? I just want to leave him… I can’t deal with this anymore.”
“Did he hit you?”
The long pause was more than enough confirmation for what had happened. Tobias began to swear and call Zander every offensive name in the book. “How many times has this happened, Joanna? How long have you been dealing with this and not telling anyone?”
“It doesn’t matter,” I said. “I’m dealing with it now by to leave. Look, I know this is asking a lot, but I just need a place to stay until I get back on my feet again.”
“Then come over,” Tobias said. “Pack your bags and get the hell away from him immediately. I’ll lend you however much money you need, you know that.”
Yes, I knew that all too well. Tobias was well-off, too well-off for his own good. He was wealthy, and his solution to all problems was to throw money at them; it was a strategy that had worked well for him for years though, so I couldn’t exactly fault him for it. But, it wasn’t my preferred way of dealing with problems. If being with Zander had taught me one thing, it was that I didn’t want to ever depend on a man for anything, even if it was my adoring older brother. I wanted to have my own money and make my own way.
“I don’t want your money, Tobias,” I said. “I just want you to give me a spot to rest my head until I can find another job and get my own place.”
Tobias sighed. “Joanna, you’re my sister. It’s my job to look out for you.”
“To look out for me—yes. To take care of me—no.”
“Let me just lend you the money and you can pay it back when you can, then.”
“Tobias, please, I don’t want your charity.”
“Why are you always so difficult?” he said, exasperated. “All right. Fine. How about this, work for me.”
I paused. “What?”
“Work for me. You can work for my firm. You’re looking for a new job, right? So I’m offering you one. With your background in financial planning, we really could use someone like you, sis. And I’m not just saying that. We’ve actually been looking to hire someone for a while now.”
I chewed my bottom lip, considering his offer.
“I know you can’t think of a valid reason to turn me down,” Tobias said, “so just say yes. What do you have to lose?”
“Nothing,” I said quietly. “I have nothing to lose.”
“Then welcome to the team. Pack your bags tonight and make your way over here. And if you really want to do me proud, you’ll burn down Zander’s place in the process.”
I chuckled through my tears. “Thank you, Tobias.”
“No problem..”
I hung up the phone, feeling some of the tightness in my chest starting to loosen. As I made it back to my car, I reflected on Tobias’ offer. It was a good solution, and I had a feeling it would work…
Feeling determined, I headed back to Zander’s apartment. Carefully creeping back inside, I was grateful to find him passed out from his drunken stupor.
As quickly and quietly as I could, I packed everything I owned, ready to leave him behind forever.
CHAPTER 2
Anderson
It was a slow day at the office, but I didn’t exactly mind. Sitting at my desk, I leaned back in my chair and stared out the window, taking in the highway and the constant flow of traffic.
“What’s going on? Working hard or hardly working?”
I looked up to find Tobias, my best friend as well as my business partner at our firm, strolling into my office. Sometimes it was hard to imagine that fortune had been so good to us. We had grown up together, studied together, and now worked together, each of us having more success with our careers that we could have ever anticipated.
“Let’s make a deal,” Tobias had said to me when we were young. “We’re never going to leave each other behind, got it?”
I had readily agreed. “Right. Whoever succeeds first helps the other.”
“That’s right! We make our money together. Partners for life.”
We’d clasped hands afterwards and vowed to each other that we would honor that promise for the rest of our lives.
It had been easy to keep that promise. Throughout our time knowing each other, we had become more than best friends and partners in crime—we were brothers. We knew each other’s families, secrets, strengths, and weaknesses.
“Well, you got to work hard at some point to get to the point where you can hardly work, right?” I said as Tobias flopped into the chair opposite of me.
“Guess you’ve got a point there,” he said, temporarily closing his eyes.
“Looks like your day has been busier than mine,” I said.
“Damn straight it has.” Tobias reopened his eyes and sighed. He then grew quiet for a moment, a deep line forming across his brow, letting me know that something was wrong.
“What is it, man?” I asked, watching him carefully.
Tobias grimaced. “You remember that asshole, Zander?”
“No,” I said, drawing a blank. The name sounded somewhat familiar, but I couldn’t place my finger on why.
“You know, the guy my sister is dating. I know I’ve told you about him before.”
“Oh,” I said, nodding. “Okay. Yeah. What about him? Are they getting married or something?”
Tobias shook his head. “No. She’s le
aving him.”
“Why? What happened?”
Tobias shrugged his shoulders, although I got a feeling he was holding something back. I knew how protective he was of his sister though, so I decided not to press the issue; if he didn’t want to talk about it, it must have been something pretty fucking bad. And if he wanted me to know, he would tell me when he was ready.
I had met Tobias’ sister, Joanna, back when she was just a kid in high school. She had been tiny and nerdy, with a bad attitude and a knack for following us around, just to aggravate us. In other words, a typical annoying kid sister. Although I had never been particularly fond of her, I kept those feelings to myself because I knew Tobias well enough to know that he would probably kill for that girl. I never had siblings of my own, and she had always made me glad that I didn’t.
I had a feeling that if things went wrong with her boyfriend, the fault probably lied on her, for if she was still the obnoxious know-it-all that I remembered her being, no man would be able to put up with her long. Thus, Zander probably just wanted a way out, and I couldn’t blame him.
Tobias, on the other hand, was clearly peeved off about something breaking his baby sister’s heart. He was still being mum about what precisely happened though.
I cleared my throat. “Why are you telling me this?” I asked. “You’re not planning on doing something stupid, are you? You work for a huge firm, Tobias. You know we can’t afford to have you going on a killing spree in your little sister’s honor. She’s a big girl now. Let her handle herself. She’ll get over it. Everyone does. You can’t be her own personal superhero forever.”
“Oh, shut up,” Tobias said.
I laughed.
“Anyway,” he continued, “I’m telling you because she’s coming here.”
I raised my eyebrows. “Here? To my office?”
“Here to work for us.”
I tilted my head to the side. “What’s she got a background in again?”
“She’s a financial planner. You know how smart she is. She’ll make a great asset. We need someone to help us keep track of these numbers. I get a headache just thinking about it.”
Numbers gave me a headache too, but I wasn’t sure I was willing to put up with Joanna and her Miss-Know-It-All attitude; that was likely to give me even more of a headache. I fought hard to keep the sneer off my face at the thought of her being in our workplace, breathing down our backs and trying to tell us how to do our job. “I’m not sure I’m following. What does breaking up with her boyfriend have to do with her needing to work here?”
“She was living with Zander and now that she’s leaving him, she needs to relocate and find work elsewhere. They were in Miami and she doesn’t want to stay out there by herself. She needs to get away from him. So I told her to come stay with me and to work for us until she gets herself back on her feet. I offered to just give her whatever she needed, but she wouldn’t go for that. You know how she can be.”
“Oh yeah, I definitely know how she can be,” I muttered.
“Well, I just wanted to give you a heads up since she’ll be around soon. You’re okay with this, right?”
I gave a tight-lipped grin while images of the snotty little girl I knew drifted through my mind. The girl that used to turn her nose up at me and complain about me being too loud while she was studying. The girl who used to turn every differing opinion into a debate of some sort. If I was not mistaken, she had once called me a chauvinist pig. Yet she insisted on staying around me, likely just to spite me.
“Yeah, I’m cool with it,” I lied, because I knew there was nothing else I could say. After all, Tobias was like my brother, which made Joanna my sister by default even if I didn’t like it. “Gotta look out for family, right?”
Tobias smiled. “Thanks, man. I knew you would understand.”
“Of course,” I said, although my throat felt a little tight. I reached for the bottle of water at the corner of my desk and took a long sip. “Just out of curiosity, how long do you anticipate her working with us?”
Tobias stood and shrugged his shoulders. “Who knows? Probably not long though. Joanna has always been independent, so I’m sure she’ll be moving along as soon as she can. This is just a temporary fix. Anyway, I’ll talk to you later.”
“All right,” I said as Tobias left my office.
I knew he had a point though. Joanna wouldn’t be around long. The more I thought about it, the more insignificant the situation felt. Not before long, I got back to work, no longer caring about what was going on with Joanna one way or another.
CHAPTER 3
Joanna
It was funny how a week could feel so slow and long at the same time, but that was precisely how I felt after staying with my brother. Tobias was accommodating as usual, but there was still a lot of adjustment. First, the simple transition of moving back to Chicago after living in Miami was a lot to adapt to on its own. When I added in the fact that I’d left a good job and a beautiful apartment—sometimes it felt too much to bear. Yet I kept reminding myself that it was for the best; no job, apartment, or beautiful climate was worth me being unhappy, terrorized, and battered.
I hadn’t seen my brother in a while, but I should have known his taste was as extravagant as always, especially now that he had such abundant funds to back it up. After leaving the airport, I took an Uber to his place even though he had offered to have someone get me.
“Tobias, I’m grown. I don’t need you sending me chaperones,” I had told him.
“Your age has nothing to do with it. You’re just stubborn. Fine, suit yourself.”
“Is this where you’re going, miss?” the Uber driver asked as he pulled up in front of my brother’s mansion with its perfect lawn.
I looked down at the address Tobias had texted to my phone. “Yep.”
The driver let out a low and impressed whistle. “Wow. Must be nice being you,” he said.
I huffed. “Looks aren’t always what they seem,” I muttered, readjusting the sunglasses on my face and then letting myself out of the car. “Thanks for the ride.”
“No problem. Need any help with your luggage?”
“No, I got it. Thanks.”
By evening, I was sitting at the dining room table with my brother, in front of a meal that was way too extravagant for just the two of us. In his eagerness to give me a warm welcome, he’d had all my favorite foods catered in for dinner. I couldn’t deny that everything looked and smelled delicious, rotisserie chicken, baked macaroni and cheese, green beans, buttermilk biscuits, apple pie, and iced tea. Unfortunately, I didn’t have much of an appetite.
“Tobias, honestly, you shouldn’t have,” I said.
“Don’t tell me what I should or shouldn’t do in my own house,” he said. “If I want to treat my little sister to a nice dinner, then I’ll do it.”
“Whatever,” I said.
“Take off those sunglasses, Jo. You look ridiculous.”
I pressed my lips together and stared down into my plate. Although I knew I couldn’t walk around wearing sunglasses indefinitely, it made my stomach squirm to let him see what Zander had done to me.
“It looks worse than it feels,” I said, and then reluctantly removed them. I remained staring down at my plate for a long time. When I finally got the nerve to look at Tobias, he wore a deep frown.
“Are you going to tell me precisely what happened or not?” he asked. “How long has he been treating you like this, Joanna?”
I didn’t want to engage the conversation, but with the way Tobias stared at me from across the table, demanding an answer, I knew it couldn’t be avoided. Besides, considering the major favor he was doing for me in allowing me to stay with him for a while, he had the right to know.
I sighed. “He didn’t start out that way, I swear. He was perfect in the beginning. But maybe that was the problem all along. He was too perfect. I should have known something was off… The first time he hit me, it was because I hadn’t cooked dinner for him. It was st
upid, but so was every other time we argued. Our arguments never had any real substance. He was just always nitpicking, and I was always making excuses for him. I just kept telling myself not to worry about it. That he was just stressed and it was no big deal. But the arguing kept getting more and more frequent. And we kept getting more and more agitated with each other and…”
“And he started hitting you more often,” Tobias said. His eyes trailed the bruises on my face, and I could practically feel the silent fury emanating from him. “You know you should have said something sooner, right?”
I lowered my gaze, staring at the tablecloth. “I know, but I thought I loved him. And I thought he loved me.”
“Love doesn’t leave bruises.”
“I know that now.”
Tobias sighed. “Does he know you came here?”
I shook my head. “I left while he was sleeping. He was drunk. He probably won’t know I’m gone for another few days.”
“Do you think he’s going to come looking for you?”
I swallowed. “I hope not. I mean, he shouldn’t know where to find me, so…”
The frown remaining on Tobias’s face clearly indicated that he didn’t find my words reassuring. “Listen, if he ever comes near you again—”
“Yeah, I know,” I said, cutting off his threat, I already knew how he would end it. He’d hire some big fancy lawyer and take every Zander owned. But that wasn’t what I wanted. I just needed it all to be behind me. For it to be over. “But I don’t need you fighting all my battles for me. I can take care of myself. That’s why I left him.”
“It took you too long to leave. You should have left after the first time, Joanna.”
I reached for a sip of tea. “I’m tired,” I said, feeling drained all of a sudden.
Tobias nodded. “I have plenty of rooms. Just pick whichever one you want.” He rose from the table and stretched. “Let me know if you need anything.”
“You’ve done more than enough already. Anything else I need, I plan to earn it.”
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